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Ferry service between India, Sri Lanka

by Tharika Goonathilake

The Government will shortly introduce new legislation to operate a ferry service between India and Sri Lanka to cater to increasing tourist traffic, Travel Agents Association of Sri Lanka (TAASL) Chairman Udaya Nanayakkara told a special presentation at Hotel Taj Samudra yesterday.

The presentation was organised by Kerala Tourism to promote the 'Two Centre' holiday concept between Sri Lanka and Kerala to jointly promote the two destinations.

Nanayakkara pointed out that the ferry service would greatly ease the increasing demand for flights to India which could not be accommodated due to constraints in Indian Aviation Policy. Presently, SriLankan Airlines operates thirty two weekly flights to India. This comprises flights to Chennai- 12, Trivandrum- 7, Trichy-4, Mumbai-3, Bangalore- 3 and New Delhi- 3.

"Sri Lanka has gone to a great extent to relax frontier formalities to encourage tourist traffic from neighbouring countries. However, unfortunately this has not been reciprocal," he noted. He said that if these constraints were lifted and SriLankan Airlines was given accessibility to operate flights to Cochin the two countries could greatly increase tourist traffic to and from Sri Lanka.

Nanayakkara said that around 600,000 Sri Lankan's travel overseas every year and called on the Kerala Minister of Tourism, who was present on the occasion, to take up the matter with Indian Aviation Authorities.

Kerala Minister for Tourism Prof. K.B Thomas said that Kerala and Sri Lanka has had close ties since time immemorial and like Sri Lanka, Kerala had a diverse array of attractions that could cater to the discerning traveller.

He said that he had raised the matter of granting more 'accessibility' with Indian Aviation authorities and was positive of its outcome.

Prof.Thomas also expressed the hope that the joint program to promote the 'Two Centre Holiday Concept' with the forthcoming 'Experience Sri Lanka -Business Mart' for key delegates from Kerala would focus on both inbound and outbound travel sectors would be mutually beneficial. Sri Lankan Airlines Head of Commercial G.T Jeyaseelan said that there is a high demand for flights to India and that the airline was willing to accommodate the traffic if measures are taken to give accessibility, stressing that Sri Lanka was India's fourth largest inbound destination.

" Sri Lankan Airlines is very keen to promote India as a twin destination. We can promote more tourist traffic provided that we have more capacity to Cochin and Trivandram," he said.

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